Bill Tieleman is one of BC's best known communicators, political commentators and strategists.
Bill writes a politics column Tuesdays in 24 Hours newspaper and The Tyee online magazine.
Bill has been Communications Director in the B.C. Premier's Office and at the BC Federation of Labour.
Bill owns West Star Communications, a consulting firm providing strategy and communication services for labour, business, non-profits and government.

Powerful
government forces suddenly fire eight health ministry researchers and
contractors, alleging they breached the privacy of sensitive patient files
regarding pharmaceuticals and that the police are investigating.

One
researcher sadly commits suicide; the others are pariahs, unable to work while
government suspends their $4-million research project.

The
ruling party, one of those fired alleged
in a lawsuit, accepted significant political donations from big pharmaceutical
companies selling products to government health plans. The fired researcher continues
with a defamation lawsuit against a former minister.

Then
-- shocker -- it's disclosed
there was no police investigation, because the government never turned over
information on the alleged offences.

Most
of the researchers, who had filed wrongful dismissal and defamation lawsuits or
grievances through their union, are reinstated or paid compensation.

No
senior official is publicly disciplined for firings -- and government refuses
to say who was responsible or why it happened.

A
veteran lawyer hired to review the firings complains
about the lack of government records, and says that -- and the unwillingness of
officials to cooperate -- means questions about who ordered the dismissals and
why "remain unanswered."

But
it's not a deadly and manipulatively cynical segment from the hit Netflix show
House of Cards -- it's reality under the BC Liberal government.

'Difficult'
questions unanswered

Despite
an uproar when it was disclosed
the RCMP never received government information to launch an investigation into
the firings, Premier Christy Clark rejects a public inquiry to find the truth.

Further,
Clark declined offers from then-deputy minister of health Graham Whitmarsh to
cooperate with an "independent and full review" of the firings or his
suggestion that B.C.'s auditor general investigate the matter.

Clark's
own deputy minister, John Dyble, and Lynda Tarras, deputy minister and head of
the Public Service Agency, are alleged
by Whitmarsh to have been involved in briefings regarding the original firings
-- and were therefore, he claims, in a conflict of interest in the government
review.

Whitmarsh
declined
to participate in the review, saying it was not sufficiently independent of
government while noting that was not the fault of experienced labour lawyer
Marcia McNeil, who conducted it.

McNeil,
who did not interview the fired researchers for her review, nevertheless was
damning in her conclusions.

"I
have found that the investigation was flawed from the outset, as it was
embarked upon with a pre-conceived theory of employee misconduct," McNeil wrote.
"Two of the most difficult questions I considered during my review were
who effectively made the dismissal decisions and what factors were considered.
Those questions remain unanswered."

Nor
has the government apologized
to many of the researchers, only saying sorry to the family of Roderick
MacIsaac, who took his own life after the firings.

Employees
humiliated, angry

NDP
critic Adrian Dix has doggedly pursued this case for three years, and said in
an email interview Sunday: "This was an abuse of power by the powerful,
all reporting to Premier Clark, that ruined lives and damaged health care. They
can't be allowed to get away with it."

Leave
the last words to Ron Mattson, one of the fired researchers who won a
settlement for wrongful dismissal. Mattson is a respected project manager and
also city councillor in View Royal near Victoria who was re-elected
last fall to his seventh term.

Mattson
said the B.C. government's repeated claims that the RCMP was investigating --
when the police never got any information -- were intentionally vengeful.

"Even
though there was a settlement, telling the public there was a police
investigation... you are still tainted. It was done to support the
firings, and basically we all felt it was done to humiliate us and
beat us down, otherwise why would you make up a story like that? We
are angry," Mattson told
CBC Radio last week.

And
the only way to get to the truth?

"We
want to find out who is responsible and we want those responsible to
have to pay some sort of consequence, and probably the only way to do
that is if there is a formal public inquiry," Mattson said.

7 comments:

DPL
said...

Governments makes mistakes and the Government,instead to providing real information as to who screwed up,ruining ex employees lives, they try to hide the facts. Somebody blew it and they won't open the files to show who messed it up.They feel they are secure with their majority so it's deny, bury the facts. Since they won't even consider the careers they ruined, and the suicide of one, there needs to be an open inquiry to get the issues resolved.

An employer,or government that mismanages things must be held accountable. Stand up and admit responsible for errors made.

Please start a petition for a full independent public inquiry. We can not let this slide. A good man took his life because of this. We owe it to him to get to the bottom of this. I have heard it was done to keep champex the stop smoking drug going for a big pharma liberal donator.

Thanks for this summary of this government debacle. The fault line currently being explored (that the research being done would somehow bring the drug companies into disrepute) seems, to me, to be a little thin. Big pharma donations to the BC Libs has been reported to be (only!)in the range of $500,000 over 10 years.I suspect that something bigger is at play here. Here are the c'crumbs' of the story. CC promises that the government will supply and fund the drugs to help citizens quit smoking. This was during her campaign to get elected (as leader of the Libs?). Government then approves the drugs because the new Premier had promised it - therefore it was done. This was reported last week. After the government supports the supply of these stop-smoking medications, it is reported elsewhere in news reports that the use of these drugs in other jurisdictions has contributed to health/mental health problems, including suicidal ideation, if not actual suicides from the drug-induced depression. (I don't remember if there were actual deaths).So...IF the drugs were improperly approved, just because the Premier said they should be, and IF the drugs turn out to have significant problems attached to them, and if the researchers 'connected the dots' about medication use and negative effects (and perhaps were going to blow the whistle on this) - that might have put them in jeopardy. A big question that is tied to the specific medications is - if the drugs are approved because they are a pet-project by Christy Clark,(not through proper evaluation)and IF there are threats of government $$$ liability or the Premier could be seen to be vulnerable on this (politically and via law suits) - would it not be 'wise' for senior government officials to bury the information trail and engage in a persistent cover-up? My hunch is that the core of the issue is connected to the dysfunction of the medication and the dysfunction of the 'approval' process. That is a bigger political and personal 'bomb' than donations to a political party.

An inquiry would cost money, but "a lot"? or too much? Where's the cost/benefit analysis? Would preventing further suicides caused by a cavalier government---any cavalier government---not be worth it? And we shouldn't forget the pharmaceutical safety aspect: an inquiry into this particular case would indeed benefit society if pharmaceutical safety is enhanced as a result---and it appears that drug-safety is indeed relevant to this issue. Most citizens would approve of the deterrent value of an inquiry: we don't want this to ever happen again. Finally, justice needs to be seen to be done---if there is justice to be achieved here, it cannot be private, as in paying hush-money to these particular victims. Citizens want to know that they won't become victims too.

The cost aspect is a red-herring, and those who insist an inquiry would be too expensive are widely regarded as biased for some reason or other. It would be just as sensible to insist that it would be unfair not to favour this or any other bias.

There's no such thing as "The Left"; the counter to the neo-right BC Liberals is ethical, not ideological government. That being said, it is suspiciously and speciously partisan to suggest the findings would not be accepted by any group in particular. The objective of an inquiry would be to find out if laws were broken---the same laws that govern "left" or "right" or anybody else---who broke the laws i--- whoever they are, and however they characterize themselves politically--- and to find out how such tragic events can be avoided in the future---everyone's future, not "The Left", not "The Right", but everybody's.

Prob'ly the understatement of the month, but Anon's suggestion that an inquiry would be a waste of money sounds like it comes from a BC Liberal shill. I will agree that BC Liberals have lots to worry about this issue. It doesn't look like it will go away on its own, and only gets hotter the more they stonewall. Yeah, I can see why BC Liberals would take that position.

Bill Tieleman and Senator Larry Campbell, former Vancouver mayor

Jim Sinclair, Cindy Oliver, Ken Georgetti and Bill Tieleman

Bill Tieleman's coverage of the Basi-Virk/BC Legislature Raid Case praised by other journalists:

"This outstanding piece of journalism, in The Tyee, is the work of a journalist who has been deeply involved with this issue from the start and this article should be passed on as far and wide as possible."

"Bill Tieleman from 24 hours . . . . If you want to know about this trial and about this case, you have to read his blog – I mean, that’s just all there is to it – it’s required reading if you want to understand the BC Legislature Raid situation."

- Mike Smyth, columnist, The Province

"The Basi-Virk case....you’ve probably sat through more of these hearings and gone through more of the files and written about it than any other journalist in the province."

- Bill Good, host, The Bill Good Show, CKNW/Corus Radio Network

"Tieleman ...has done a first-rate job covering the trial."

- Paul Willcocks, columnist, the Victoria Times-Colonist

"Tieleman, who marries a considerable journalistic talent with one of the smartest political minds in the province, has been writing more web-exclusive material. And his coverage of the Basi-Virk trial is a must-read -- whether you're an insider or an outsider."

"24 Hours, the Vancouver paper that has been leading the coverage, as well as the hints of conspiracy in B.C."

- Norman Spector, columnist, Globe and Mail

"Although the major media in this circumstance has been giving the case significant coverage, Tieleman's reports on his blog have been outstanding.

The entire cut and thrust of legal wrangling and arguments has been covered and is accompanied by considered analysis.....His blog site coverage of the Basi-Virk trial is the most in depth treatment of one of British Columbia's biggest political scandals."

- Bill Bell, columnist, The North Shore News

"Mr. Tieleman has published online dispatches which, freed from the limitations of newsprint space or broadcast time, can run at length. They also remain available for those select readers who become obsessed with a case also known as Railgate.....

In another bizarre twist to a story with no shortage of them, Mr. Tieleman went to work one day in December only to discover his office had been ransacked. Bookcases had been tipped over and papers strewn, but nothing was missing.

To top it off, a press kit for the self-published novel The Raid, written by a retired military officer in Metchosin and featuring on its cover a photograph from the 2003 police raid, had been left in a conspicuous place."

- Tom Hawthorn, columnist, The Globe and Mail

Nobody has followed the Basi-Virk affair over its past five years with greater diligence than local journalist, Bill Tieleman....Tieleman deserves our thanks, a fistful of journalism awards and some merit citation for citizenship.